An unexpected surge of refugees from African countries began in May 2023, when Toronto’s shelter system was already over capacity with close to 3,000 refugees. The number of asylum seekers in Toronto’s shelter system multiplied by more than 500 percent, from a low of about 530 people per night in September 2021 to more than 2,800 in May 2023.
When news broke in July 2023 that a wave of newly arrived refugees from African countries were living on the sidewalk outside a city shelter on Peter Street in Toronto, it could not have come at a worse time. With the number of unhoused people already exploding, the pressure on housing in the greater Toronto area was at a level we had not seen before. This wasn’t just a wave. It was a tsunami. And it crushed whatever was left of the city’s support system.
While the crowd outside this downtown shelter swelled by the dozens under the blistering summer heat, a bureaucratic war of words was raging.